Katy Sue Designs

Katy Sue Designs – From a Kitchen Table in South Shields to a Global Brand for Cake Decoration

Understanding how Katy Sue Designs works means understanding Susan Balfour and Doreen Thompson – and their specific talent for always picking up precisely where a gap in the market is waiting. In 1993 mother and daughter begin with porcelain dolls. Hand formed, individually fired, produced with loving attention to detail. The company Katy Sue Dolls grows beyond the kitchen, acquires its own factory in South Shields in North East England and after twelve years is supplying collectors in 28 countries. A considerable success – and yet only the beginning.

In 2006, Balfour and Thompson notice that the market for porcelain figurines has passed its peak. Rather than continuing the successful model, they make a bold decision: restart. The company is renamed Katy Sue Designs, the focus shifts to paper crafts and card making. A sector in which the duo again finds its footing and again grows – until 2012 when the next pivot follows, one that will change the brand forever.

2012: Silicone Moulds and an Award in the First Year

The decision to manufacture silicone moulds for cake decoration seems obvious in hindsight. In 2012 it was bold. Katy Sue Designs enters a market segment that has no clear quality brand yet – and sets a standard from the outset that is oriented to craft, not price. The silicone moulds developed by the team from South Shields are tested for food-safe use, flexible enough for clean demoulding and detailed enough that complex motifs – petals, facial features, border patterns, texture surfaces – can be reproduced sharply and cleanly in fondant or other mouldable materials.

The result of the first year speaks for itself: the cupcake topper moulds win the Most Innovative Product Award from the Craft and Hobby Association of America – an American award for a British product that had its origins on a kitchen table in South Shields. It is the beginning of a long list of accolades. The company has won in the same category multiple times since and has established itself as one of the most-awarded manufacturers in the area of silicone moulds for cake decoration.

In-House Design, Plastishim and Collaboration with World-Class Confectioners

What sets Katy Sue Designs apart from pure trade brands is the in-house design process. All moulds are developed internally – by an in-house design team that does not order from catalogues but develops at the drawing board and in their own workshop what baking enthusiasts and professionals genuinely need. Susan Balfour is not only CEO but also a mould-maker in the technical sense: she invented Plastishim, a specialist product for the precise creation of casting mould seam lines – an innovation now used worldwide in the film, casting and moulding industries.

For specific collections, Katy Sue Designs collaborates with specialists at the absolute top of their field. In 2016 the Creative Cake System is created with Chef Ceri Griffiths – a range of moulds for classic borders and ornaments, developed by a confectioner who worked for the British Royal Family and made cakes for the Queen herself. In 2017 the Flower Pro collection follows in collaboration with Nicolas Lodge, one of the world's best-known sugar flower specialists. The Flower Pro moulds, veiners and cutters were co-created with Lodge, who brought the botanical expertise that turns fondant into convincingly realistic, detailed blossoms.

What Silicone Moulds Achieve – and Why That Is Technically Relevant

A silicone mould is more than a negative form. It is a tool that makes the results of professional craftsmanship reproducible. The principle is simple: the mould is dusted with cornflour. Fondant – or another mouldable material such as isomalt, flower paste, modelling clay or soap – is worked in layer by layer, starting with the detail colours in the deepest part of the mould and ending with the base colour. This means that when demoulded, multi-coloured motifs emerge with the finest details already incorporated. The flexibility of the silicone allows clean release, even for complex motifs with undercuts.

The decisive quality characteristic lies in the precision of the mould surface: the finer the depth of engraving and the more even the wall thickness of the silicone, the sharper the result in the fondant. Inexpensive moulds from thin silicone lose their shape when being filled and produce blurred or distorted motifs. Katy Sue Designs moulds are known for this sharpness – leaf veins, facial features, textures that are actually visible in the finished product. Colour powders applied with fine brushes after demoulding refine the result further: rosy cheeks, colour gradients on petals, gold accents on borders.

The Range

Silicone moulds in hundreds of motifs: flowers and botanical forms (Flower Pro line with veiners and cutters), faces and figurines, borders and classic ornaments (Creative Cake System), seasonal decor, fantasy motifs and everyday scenes. Suitable for fondant, flower paste, modelling clay, isomalt, soap and other mouldable materials. Tested as food-safe, flexible, reusable, dishwasher-safe.

Silicone moulds for fondant & sugarcraft · Flower Pro collection · Creative Cake System · Seasonal & themed motifs

Katy Sue Designs at miniSchoggi

Professional-level cake decoration is – without years of learned craft – often precisely what separates a homemade cake from a truly impressive one. Not the batter. Not the filling. The decoration. A sugar rose that looks like it came from a confectionery. A border that appears even and clean. Faces and figurines where proportions and details are right. Katy Sue Designs silicone moulds make exactly this possible – not because they replace skills, but because they provide the tool with which these skills quickly take hold. The difference between a result that looks 'quite good' and one that leaves someone speechless often comes down to a single tool that delivers the right details.

What distinguishes the moulds from inexpensive alternatives is directly tangible: the depth of the engraving, the evenness of the silicone, the sharpness of the result after demoulding. Years of experience in mould-making – combined with feedback from baking enthusiasts in over 50 countries and collaboration with confectioners at world-class level – is what produces this quality. miniSchoggi carries Katy Sue Designs because the range is relevant for everyone who decorates cakes, cupcakes and other baked goods – from the first attempt to the experienced professional. The range available at miniSchoggi includes a wide selection of silicone moulds for various occasions and applications and is continuously expanded.

1993. South Shields, North East England. From porcelain dolls to world-class silicone moulds. Katy Sue Designs.